How to Install, use, and customize this powerful, free, Open Source Java-based Enterprise CMS

In Detail

Alfresco offers true Enterprise Content Management (ECM) and aspires to be "Documentum fast and free", and was founded by a former Documentum executive. Alfresco can store a wide range of digital content in flexible, smart "spaces". Content is accessible through a web interface, shared network folders, FTP, WebDav, and other methods.

Users can set up Alfresco to process content in certain ways, according to business rules and workflow requirements. It can also apply version control to documents automatically, making it easy and safe to collaborate and update documents.

Alfresco is regarded as the most powerful open-source enterprise content management system. Using Alfresco, administrators can easily create rich, shared content repositories. This book shows you how to unleash this power to create collaborative working systems in your enterprise.

What you will learn from this book? This book will take you through the complete cycle of planning, implementing and customizing your ECM installation. Among the many topics covered are:

* Working with users and membership accounts, including LDAP integration
* Using Alfresco as a Smart document repository; working with automatic version tracking and control, and accessing the repository from the Web, shared network folders, or FTP
* Making content easy to find using search, content categorization, and metadata
* Automating document management tasks with business rules and complete workflows
* Working together using Alfresco's collaboration and syndication features to create effective working groups
* Customizing the user interface, creating your own dashboard layouts; presenting content in custom ways relevant to your business

Approach

Munwar Shariff is an experienced software trainer for CIGNEX Inc. He has trained many users, administrators, and developers in Alfresco and many other systems. This book distils the hands-on approach of his training courses into a concise, practical book. The emphasis is on getting up and running fast and discovering the scope and power of Alfresco incrementally through practical discovery.

Who this book is written for?

This book is designed for system administrators, experienced users or developers who want to install and use Alfresco in their teams or businesses. Because Alfresco is free many teams can install and experiment with its ECM features without any upfront cost, often without management approval. The book assumes a degree of technical confidence but does not require specialist sysadmin or developer skills to get a basic system up and running.

Alfresco is particularly suitable for IT consultants who want or need to set up a flexible enterprise content management system for their clients, be that for demonstration, development, or as a mission-critical platform. This book gets you to that result quickly and effectively